Silent Pursuit
by Kristen Sharpe
Summary: A routine night patrol abruptly becomes a deadly dogfight when the SWAT Kats encounter a mysterious and relentless pursuer. [Complete]


Title: Silent Pursuit  
Author: Kristen Sharpe  
E-Mail: skgirl@hotmail.com  
Date: July 27, 1998  
Finished: November 16, 1999  
  
This story was originally written in response to a mailing list challenge -  
write a dogfight sequence. So, here is mine. It's a bit different from my usual   
fanfics and there are details hanging that won't be explained until later. This is   
intended to figure into my series of stories following "Technical Difficulties," so   
expect elements of this to return in the future.  
  
------------------------  
  
Searing bursts of red fire lit the night in a hellish glow. The fiery   
brilliance glinted in lightning flashes across the night-dark fuselage of the powerful   
fighter jet as it darted and swooped through the midnight sky. The fireblasts were as   
silent as though the dark expanse of sky were the infinite night of space. But the   
jet's thunder belied the illusion, its powerful engines roaring, sending echoes into   
the night.   
  
No moon lit the battlefield of the sky tonight. It was a carpet of the deepest   
navy. Only distant fuzzy glows in the abyss below penetrated the fog that blanketed   
the jagged mountain peaks that stood as the sole audience to the battle in the skies.  
  
Savagely, the big tomkat piloting the sable jet jerked the stick toward his   
body and sent the sleek aircraft into a near-vertical climb. Engines roaring defiantly,   
the fighter fought the earthward tug of gravity. The tomkat, his face a surreal green   
in the light of the HUD before him, braced himself against the forces that fought to   
restrain any creature audacious enough to attempt such speed, such height. His pale   
golden fur barely masked the taut muscles that stretched across his tense face.   
Sweat-matted, the fur clung to his skin, damp and clammy in the hot air of the cockpit.   
  
In the rear of the cockpit, the slim weapons officer grit his teeth and fought   
to hold onto his bucking stomach as the jet soared ever higher. He was needed now,   
perhaps more than ever. Doggedly, he refused to succumb to the g-forces, stubbornly   
clinging to consciousness as an even deeper night than that outside the cockpit began   
to blot out the fringes of his vision. He flinched as his dimming vision perceived   
another burst of red slashing past the cockpit glass, the reminder of the situation   
at hand helping to snap him from his stupor.   
  
Their relentless pursuer was closing even as they thundered into insane   
altitudes. The orange-furred kat fingered the stick before him, gently pressing the   
top of the cap that sheltered the firing button. He let his fingers slid from it to   
squeeze the hand-contoured side of his stick. He had precious little use for that at   
the moment. Self defense wasn't an option tonight - not yet anyway. As he reflected   
on the situation, the slim tomkat thrust the rising panic he felt back into the pit   
from which it had come. He was needed now, by his partner and friend if no one else.  
  
"Razor, I'm goin' ta' Speed of Heat!" the burly pilot shouted back to him   
suddenly, his voice strained and gruff.   
  
"Roger," Razor forced out with some effort. He felt the incredible force slam   
into his chest, felt his body pinned to the padded seat at his back. Fighting the   
awesome force, Razor tried to focus on solving their dilemma. He glanced briefly at   
the soft glow that was the dimensional radar before him. The blurred green mass still   
hovered just behind the TurboKat. Razor growled softly, half cursing a system that  
could almost blind them to an enemy, half wishing to study it. Resigned that   
technology would be no help, he closed his eyes and tried to bring the image of the   
pursuing craft to mind.   
  
He'd seen it only in flashes, spurts of fire that illuminated the night. He   
conjured a vague vision of a fighter reminiscent of the TurboKat in design. Sleek,   
pointed nose,... multiple engines - but that was only a half-educated guess. Mind   
churning, Razor struggled with the effort of thinking as the pressure on his chest   
increased. He was starting to breath heavily, taking gulping breathes of the   
unnatural air that his oxygen mask provided. He tried to collect his thoughts. He   
needed to see the other jet, needed to...  
  
Razor suddenly felt the TurboKat level out. His stomach immediately took flight   
all on its own. He knew what was coming. Any second now they would plunge back   
downward, aiming at a trajectory that would take them far from their pursuer, far from   
the mountains, aiming at the miles of barren desert that stretched away from MegaKat   
City. Razor battled the urge to succumb to the blackness of unconsciousness. The   
temptation pressed him relentlessly. How much more pleasant to pass out now than to   
face the suffocating pressure he knew was to come?  
  
"You still with me?" the voice cut through the fog numbing his brain. Razor's   
eyes snapped open at the sound. With effort, he snorted derisively in response.  
  
"I can handle just as many g's as you, T-Bone!" he growled through his nausea.  
  
T-Bone chuckled softly.  
  
"Let's see ya' prove it tomorrow in the centrifuge, eh?" he retorted.  
  
Razor grinned faintly at T-Bone's cocky certainty.   
  
"Hope yer ready for more," T-Bone warned.  
  
"Bring it on!" Razor snapped, setting his jaw and taking a tight grip on the   
handholds by his seat as the jet rolled to the right to plummet downward.   
  
The solid reassurance of floor beneath him suddenly vanished and, for an   
instant, the orange-furred kat felt as though he were alone in free fall, nothing   
supporting him. Then, the TurboKat rematerialized around him, his seat beneath him.   
Razor began his fight with the g's anew.  
  
T-Bone, meanwhile, ignored the g-forces. The crushing force wasn't pleasant,   
but his rock-like stomach stayed safely grounded. The big kat's concentration was   
centered on his flying. His green eyes were dilated to their fullest and still he saw   
nothing through the canopy. He focused on the dimensional radar's output and his   
other instruments for guidance. The altimeter's needle was dropping at an incredible,  
but safe enough, rate. The dimensional radar, its image generator struggling to alter   
the incoming images at pace with the jet's descent, indicated a fast-approaching mountain   
peak below. T-Bone grunted and angled the jet away from the peak and toward the expanse   
of flat grids the radar displayed to the left of the jagged peaks. It was taking all   
his strength to fight the inexorable force and keep the TurboKat on course.  
  
His course corrected, T-Bone glanced at the altimeter again. One mile up. Just   
above the highest of the mountains. He looked through the laser-scarred glass to find   
a single fuzzy pinprick of light below. The only inhabited dot on this side of the   
mountain range, a ranger station or something of the sort if his and Razor's assumptions   
were correct. Satisfied, he began to level the jet out.  
  
Razor slowly returned from the foggy, half-conscious realm he'd entered as the   
TurboKat plunged from the sky. The radar's green light greeted his night-conditioned   
eyes and he blinked.  
  
"Hey, Razor, you there?" T-Bone called from the dimness ahead of him.  
  
"Yeah, most of me anyway," Razor returned, blinking again.  
  
"Man, Razor, there was already so little of you," T-Bone teased.  
  
"Yeah, yeah," Razor griped. Movement out of the corner of his eye quickly   
drew his attention to the dimensional radar screen. "Uh, oh, I think our friend has   
just realized where we are," he murmured.  
  
T-Bone looked up sharply to see the green shape, now only a speck on his   
dimensional radar scope, growing larger by the second as the craft homed in on them.  
  
His head clearing, Razor remembered his thoughts from earlier.  
  
"T-Bone, put us in hover mode and just wait," he ordered suddenly.  
  
T-Bone grunted an affirmative and did as Razor had told him before questioning   
his partner's scheme. The VTOL engines were locked in position and holding the TurboKat   
steady before he gave in to his curiosity.  
  
"So, what's the plan?"  
  
"First, I wanna see this guy," Razor returned, amber eyes narrowing. "When he   
gets close enough, I'm gonna light up his life."   
  
"And, make 'im see spots for his next seven lives," T-Bone chuckled.   
  
Razor grinned at the comment but quickly sobered, remembering the seriousness   
of their situation. His smile returned suddenly, a tight, grim quirk of his mouth   
that held a surprisingly generous spark of hope. "And, maybe I can give us an edge in   
the process. Get directly above him as fast as you can after the flash."   
  
"Whatever you say," T-Bone agreed. Razor didn't need his eyes to see the big   
tabby's cocky grin. Live or die, this was how T-Bone would choose to do either - at   
his job, trying his hardest.  
  
And, yet....  
  
Razor had always appreciated T-Bone's confidence in his abilities, but now   
his partner's trust was shaking his own confidence. He didn't like being responsible   
for both their lives. Needing reassurance of any plan he might devise, he started to   
ask his partner for an honest estimate of their chances. He stopped himself hurriedly,   
choking the words down. Why annihilate T-Bone's half-jocular mood? It was his   
partner's defense mechanism against the kind of fears that were churning about Razor's   
own mind. No, it was unfair to ask it of his friend.   
  
T-Bone, however, seemed to sense the unasked question.  
  
"Think he was lyin'?" he asked Razor, voice soft but rumbling in his deeper   
registers.  
  
"Loadin' your jet with a homemade nuclear weapon just to chase us down...."   
Razor shook his head in utter frustration. "It's crazy, but then, how many crazies   
have we fought in the last month?"  
  
T-Bone nodded in agreement, either forgetting that his partner couldn't see   
the movement or knowing that it wasn't necessary.  
  
"If it weren't for that theft at MegaKat Nuclear Plant months ago..." Razor   
trailed off before mumbling another half-verbalized thought. "If he's the one, he had   
enough uranium to make a bomb - a tiny one, but it's still a nuclear weapon." Razor   
fell silent and glanced at the rapidly growing mass steadily crossing the radar scope.   
Knowing the few possibilities - one of which would.. *must* come - he felt a coldness   
settling in the pit of his stomach.  
  
"Well, we're alone now, so it's him or us," T-Bone growled abruptly, his voice   
now full volume and laced with anger.   
  
Or both of us..., Razor added silently in his mind.  
  
Talk ended as each kat became lost in his own thoughts, waiting. Each tomkat's   
muscles were taut. T-Bone gripped the stick one-handed, his other hand hovering by   
the throttle and the controls that would fire the rear engines and retract the VTOL   
engines. He would have seconds after Razor's missile was away to move the jet; until   
that instant, they would be sitting ducks. Razor squeezed his stick one-handed as   
always, his pointer finger resting at the edge of the firing cap. He had to gauge   
his timing perfectly. He needed optimum range for the flashbulb missile to give him   
the view of their attacker that he needed, but they couldn't sit like this long once   
the other craft was within firing range. Both kats waited; waited for the faceless   
demon that had pounced upon them in the skies above the nightlife of MegaKat City,   
their silent pursuer.  
  
The green blur on the radar scope was regaining its former proportions rapidly.   
  
"That's it, let's get it over with," T-Bone purred softly.  
  
Razor tightened his grip on the stick, raising his other hand to flip down the   
visor in his helmet. As he did so, he thought of his partner.  
  
"Lower your anti-glare visor," the orange-furred kat hissed a reminder as he   
flipped the firing cap up. His flicking ears registered T-Bone's response as he   
focused his attention on the radar scope. "Aaand," the orange-furred SWAT Kat   
breathed, stretching the word as his targeting graphics appeared on the radar scope.   
The lock tone sounded. "Locked... AWAY!" Razor screamed the two words in one breath.  
  
Razor's eyes locked on his scope as the missile shot to its target. Closer and   
closer. His head jerked up, eyes straining into the night as blinding light burst upon   
the sable carpet of the night sky. The flash was echoed in the SWAT Kat's field of   
vision as the cascade of light seared his retina. Razor gasped at the pain, the blast   
lashing across his sight even through the visor.   
  
Even as his lids clamped down, the SWAT Kat smiled in some small triumph. He'd   
seen it. The other jet. A fighter. It was a fighter of some sort... Reminiscent of   
their own jet. Just as he'd thought... though unlike any he'd ever seen. His mind   
racing a mile a minute in an effort to process the find, Razor missed the TurboKat's   
sudden acceleration until T-Bone's gruff bark snapped him back to reality.   
  
"Razor! We're almost in position over his jet! You only have a few more   
seconds!"  
  
"That's all I need," Razor returned coolly, reaching for the button that would   
lower the TurboKat's magnetic lock-on device.   
  
As T-Bone matched speed with the other craft, Razor gauged the location of   
their pursuer's jet. Closer, closer... There! His finger snapped down on the button.   
Razor waited. Then, a solid 'thunk' from below assured him that the magnet had locked   
on to the other fighter.  
  
"Got 'im!" he barked to T-Bone. The words were hardly from his mouth before   
he was struggling free of the restraints that kept him firmly strapped in and reaching   
for a cable beneath his seat.  
  
"Good," his partner grunted. "I'm settin' 'er down." He paused, hearing   
Razor's movement. "What're you doing?!" the big kat demanded.  
  
"If he really does have a bomb, maybe I can get to him before he can detonate   
it," Razor returned, hitting the seat release at his side and thrusting off the floor   
with his feet. The motion sent his seat sliding backward even as a panel in the floor   
opened. Cold, damp air rushed into the hot cockpit, blowing Razor's cheek fur as it   
drove stinging mist into the skin beneath. "At this point, could it hurt?"   
  
T-Bone's mouth opened to say, "Yes," then abruptly snapped shut. Razor had a   
point. "Roger," he grunted at last, deploying the TurboKat's VTOL engines and sliding   
the throttle back to the point that the thrusters were nearly closed, banked but ready.  
  
The slim kat in the rear of the jet checked his glovatrix for an instant and   
then reached a hand up to switch his visor from anti-glare to night vision mode. As   
his eyes adjusted to the visor's green images, he snatched up the end of the cable, its   
other end now secured to the base of his seat. In seconds, Razor had secured the cable   
to the belt part of his suit's harness. Prepared, he gauged the distance to the other   
jet.   
  
"I'll be back in a few minutes, bud," Razor assured his partner, trying to   
mimic the big tabby's cocky assurance. Then, he was gone, leaping from the jet into   
a few instants' freefall.   
  
T-Bone sighed deeply as he watched the suddenly diminutive figure touch down   
on the captured craft beneath their own. There were few things in the world he would   
trade for the thrill of controlling the awesome power of a fighter jet. One of them   
would be to take his partner's place and face the risks the slim kat met so often   
while he kept the mighty jet aloft.  
  
Razor quickly found footing on the flatter area just behind the cockpit,   
pausing only long enough to assure himself of his balance. He noted that their   
pursuer had shut down his engines. Whether that was a sign of defeat or a very,   
very bad sign Razor was uncertain. Quickly, knowing he had no idea what he would   
find within even as he did so, he reached around the side of the cockpit to find the   
release latch for the canopy. In one swift motion he had tripped the release. The   
canopy shot up, opening the cockpit to the damp night air.   
  
With lightning swiftness, the nimble SWAT Kat fearlessly leapt into the   
cockpit, working around the canopy and aiming for the pilot's seat. His aim was true.   
The solid, yet yielding, mass he met could only be a living creature. One that was   
now struggling wildly at the unexpected onslaught.  
  
Razor focused on his "prey." There was precious little room for a fight   
here, especially with his derriere almost hanging out of the jet. The thought was   
barely through his mind when Razor aimed a glovatrix-shielded fist at where he assumed   
the other kat's face should be.   
  
This time, his aim was off. There was a grunt of pain from his opponent and   
then a fist was slammed into the orange-furred kat's sensitive nose.   
  
Razor's head snapped back with the blow as his center of gravity leaned   
dangerously toward the open air at his back.  
  
"You SWAT Kats think you're so great!" a rough voice snarled as Razor felt a   
massive hand grasp his windpipe, pinning him to the side of the cockpit and forcing him   
over backward, out of the jet. "But, I showed you tonight, didn't I? Put your fancy   
jet in a run for its money, didn't I?"  
  
Razor's response came not from his mouth, but his feet. He brought both up and   
into his attacker's face, now dimly visible. The thrust flung the other as far back   
against the opposite side of the tiny cockpit as his harness would allow even as it   
sent Razor tumbling out of the jet and into the nothingness beyond.  
  
The SWAT Kat hurtled into the void of blackness beneath the two jets, a mile   
above the desert floor below. Before the germ of fear could even blossom in his mind,   
he was pulled up short by a sharp jerk that tugged hard on his harness. Razor let   
himself just hang in the cable's grip for a few seconds, collecting his thoughts.   
Then, his body registered discomfort where his harness, fighting against gravity's pull   
on his body, was starting to dig into his flesh. The agile kat twisted violently,   
finding the cable attached just above his tail and grasping it tightly.  
  
He had just started to pull himself upward when he heard the first shot. Razor   
froze, ears twisting in the confines of his helmet as he sought the shot's direction.   
A second shot split the night. Razor grimaced, noting the lack of a laser's glow. For   
all his jet and presumed bomb might be state of the art, the attacker was clearly using   
an old-fashioned slug thrower. Razor gasped soundlessly as a second thought tailed the   
heels of the first. And, as there was no sound of whistling bullets in *his*   
direction,... the psychopath was shooting at the TurboKat! Aiming to find the fuel   
tanks!  
  
With renewed strength, the SWAT Kat hauled himself upward, praying his efforts   
to shield the fuel tanks and lines when the TurboKat was designed would pay off.   
Thankfully, the other kat hadn't noticed his cable.  
  
T-Bone meanwhile, was debating his options. The first shot had sent his   
heart to his knees. Razor didn't carry a gun; for that matter, neither did he. And,   
nothing else quite made that distinct sound. Praying his partner was okay, he checked   
the fuel gauge for the millionth time. It was dropping rapidly. The TurboKat's   
engines roaring with the effort to support two jets, he never realized the shots'   
true direction. All he knew was that, gunshots aside, Razor was running out of time   
even as the TurboKat ran out of fuel.  
  
Pulling himself hand over hand up the cable, Razor at last found himself inches   
beneath the pursuer's jet as two more shots became audible through the sounds of the   
two jets. He reached a hand up to haul himself the last few feet and froze, debating   
his options. At length, a plan began to creep into his thought. Cautiously, the SWAT   
Kat reached out to search for a hand hold on the jet. Feeling only slick metal, he   
hefted himself upward a few more inches and found the start of the access ladder.   
His searching fingers quickly pulled the first rung from the fuselage, silently locking   
it in place.  
  
Slowly, Razor began to climb the access stairs, body pressed close to the   
jet. Subconsciously, his claws slid out and gripped the metal as he stopped to   
listen. Another shot. This time there was something more. A sharp crackle of   
electric energy, so loud it was audible over the TurboKat's roaring VTOL engines,   
tore through the night. Razor's eyes widened at the implications of that deadly sound.  
  
Above, warning lights and alarms ripped mercilessly across T-Bone's   
already-barraged senses.   
  
"What in th'....?!" T-Bone snarled, searching his instruments. "Power   
loss...?" Then, it hit him. The shots he'd heard. "Crud!" T-Bone slammed a single   
huge fist into a bare space he'd long ago selected just for the purpose along the side   
of the cockpit.  
  
"Grappling magnet power failure" flashed into being abruptly, the words   
blinking an angry crimson.  
  
"Crud!" T-Bone gasped, the word more horror than epithet now. Large fingers   
flying and fumbling across the tiny keys of his controls, the brawny tom desperately   
tried to divert more power to the grappler, even if it cost him his guidance and   
weapons systems.  
  
"Grappling magnet power failure" gained a new friend on the main   
systems screen. "Power failure eminent."  
  
T-Bone was beyond words now. A guttural snarl escaped his lips as he keyed   
the command for the auxiliary power.  
  
"Don't you dare let me down now, girl," he growled to the jet. A sickening   
jolt from below answered him. The electromagnetic grappler was losing power. And, any   
minute it would send the other jet plummeting to the valley below.   
  
The lights of T-Bone's instruments flickered intermittently, seeking power   
that wasn't there.  
  
"Don't let this happen, don't let this happen," T-Bone hissed through his   
teeth. It was no eloquent prayer, but it was heartfelt.  
  
Abruptly, the "power failure imminent" notice vanished and the instrument   
lights stabilized, fainter than their full power versions, but steady.  
  
"YEEEEESSSS!" T-Bone shrieked. Then, he stopped. "No," he mouthed.  
  
"Grappling magnet power failure."  
  
The figure in the other cockpit chuckled maliciously as he aimed his gun at   
the TurboKat anew. He never saw the figure that appeared even with him, hovering in   
space, until it was too late.  
  
Somehow flinging his body forward without the aid of any impetus beyond pushing   
against dead air, Razor swung himself into the other kat. The pursuer's gun vanished   
into the darkness below as the orange-furred kat's kick sent it spinning into the   
oblivion. With the other kat momentarily stunned, Razor released the cable and let   
himself fall onto his opponent. The two met in an ugly tangle in the cockpit. But,   
not such a confusing one that the SWAT Kat couldn't find his enemy's face this time.  
  
"That's enough," Razor hissed, shoving the triple barrel of his glovatrix into   
the other tom's throat.  
  
"Yes," chortled his prisoner. "It is. Enough that I beat you. We can all   
die together now."  
  
"What?!" Razor demanded.  
  
A new electric sizzle sent his eyes to the grappler magnet. It's trunk was   
enveloped in sparks. Realization dawned on the slim kat's face.  
  
"You cut the power to the magnet? We'll drop like a...!" Razor started.  
  
And then,... the sparks were gone.  
  
T-Bone's breath caught as the other jet suddenly dropped away. There was a   
final tug on the TurboKat as the magnet gripped the other craft in one final spastic   
pull before its power was gone. Then, the pursuer's jet disappeared, vanishing into   
the abyss below without a sound. T-Bone waited for an explosion, for anything. The   
explosion came at last, not a nuclear blast, merely the sound any craft might make   
when meeting its fate so abruptly. So, there was no nuclear bomb. Only a hoax. It   
didn't matter now.   
  
The SWAT Kat pilot bowed his head in to his chest and sat for several long   
minutes. It was more than sweat that rolled through the fur of his face now, but the   
tears came in utter silence. His shoulders did not shake, not a sob escaped his lips.   
Grief would come in time... when desolation had run its course.  
  
Seconds slid into eternity as T-Bone dealt with the loss of his partner, the   
closest he had ever had to a brother. The needle of the TurboKat's fuel gauge dipped   
lower, but such trivialities held little concern for the big SWAT Kat now.  
  
At length, something knifed through his numbed senses. Light. The sable field   
beyond the cockpit had grown gray-pink.  
  
Mopping away the sloppy wetness, T-Bone reached for the jet's controls   
mechanically. Then, he froze as sound reached his ears, sound the TurboKat did not   
make. An irregular creaking moan was emanating from behind him.  
  
Slowly, uncertainly, T-Bone fingered the clasp that released his harness and   
twisted in his seat. A cable trailed from where Razor's seat sat slid back into a   
recess at the rear of the cockpit and out the opening in the floor where the slim kat   
had exited. The cable was taut and creaking as though under great stress.  
  
T-Bone's mouth moved in silence for several seconds before he finally stumbled   
over the words, "Glad one of us isn't a moron......"  
  
The thought hung in the air before, at last, the ability to move returned to   
the great tabby. Raising the canopy, he clambered half out of the cockpit and back into   
the rear, to grab the cable and haul it up. Whatever was on its end was surprisingly   
heavy. Too heavy for his small partner alone.  
  
"He didn't......," T-Bone mouthed, looking below. He could make out a large   
dark blob in the haze below. It was only minutes later that he found the two figures   
in the blob. The blue-clad figure was clinging tightly to the cable, the other figure   
locked in a death grip under his arm.  
  
Hurriedly, T-Bone strained with all his might to heave both kats into the safety   
of the TurboKat. For some minutes, his sole focus was in pulling Razor to safety.   
Pull, pause, pull, pause. He quickly developed a rhythm. Lost in it, the big SWAT Kat   
was caught off-guard as Razor's searching hand suddenly shot through the opening.   
Securing the cable in one hand, T-Bone lunged to grasp his friend's arm with the   
other. Grabbing Razor just beyond the wrist, he paused to look into his partner's   
face, green eyes penetrating the mask to find the other kat's amber gaze. His earlier   
fears must have still been written on his face as he felt Razor give his arm a quick   
squeeze. And, those eyes.... Was that laughter he saw?   
  
"Thanks, bud," Razor grunted, breaking the moment as he hefted their   
pursuer's unconscious and dead weight into the narrow area beyond the opening before   
following himself. He paused, awkwardly standing over the inert figure of the pursuer   
and teetering just inches from the hole that dropped away into the fog-shrouded vacuum   
below. Then, he looked at T-Bone.  
  
"Told ya' I'd be back in a few minutes," he commented, the smile on his face   
growing impish.  
  
His burly partner made no reply beyond cuffing him playfully across the face.   
  
"Sure, sure. Stow the nut in the cargo bay and let's get outta here before we   
run outta fuel," he returned, his tone gruff, the green eyes behind his mask dancing   
in step to his partner's infectious good humor.  
  
  
  
  



End file.
